


Solstice

by horizon_greene



Category: Tennis RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-14
Updated: 2010-01-14
Packaged: 2017-10-06 06:33:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/horizon_greene/pseuds/horizon_greene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place immediately following the 2007 French Open.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Solstice

I can still see it—the red clay shockingly bright, smeared across Nike blue, and it's a nightmare brought to life, all horribly wrong.

I don't want to watch, but he's there in the periphery of my vision—a blur of movement and oversaturated colors that sting the corners of my eyes. And then he's touching me, with his grimy, gritty hands, the clay abrasive and rough as it rubs against my skin. I find myself wiping the excess off on my shorts during the trophy presentation, desperate to get rid of it, while he smiles and poses, teeth on metal and dark eyes peering through strands of wet, tangled hair.

Watching me.

\-----

Those same eyes are on me now as he sits across the breakfast table. Less intense, maybe, but the same—and he's still as impossible as ever.

He snuggles into his robe, patient and quiet, watching me as the silence stretches thin between us.

This is harder than it was the last time, but that shouldn't be a surprise. We didn't have a Grand Slam hanging over our heads then, and Roland Garros is still raw and painful in the forefront of my mind. The novelty of losing to Rafa has long faded, and I think he senses my growing bitterness because he's been distant and even more independent than usual this time. I could see it last night, when he'd insisted on going out, even after I'd made it clear I wasn't interested. He went by himself, ultimately, and I'd been asleep for hours by the time he returned, stumbling drunk and belligerent, babbling at me in slurred, incoherent Spanish that wavered between argumentative and plaintive. He'd passed out on the floor as the sun came up.

Now the sun is sliding into afternoon, and we're finally attempting breakfast and—more perilously—our first real conversation. Rafa doesn't make it easy for me. After that alcohol-drenched little outburst last night, he's regained all of his composure, perfectly content, now, to wait for me to make the first move.

I don't quite know what to say to him, though, and I busy myself with the food in front of me. I go after my fruit carefully, with a knife and fork, cutting slices of melon into precise, bite-sized pieces. Rafa eats with his fingers, pausing every now and then to suck the stickiness from the tips.

"Headache?" I ask finally.

He smiles. "No. Doesn't hurt."

And that doesn't make any sense, given how much he'd clearly had to drink last night. But then, I don't know when he's ever made much sense to me.

"After all that? You're lucky you're not sick," I tell him.

He shrugs. "Is not a problem for me, most times."

I fiddle with the napkin in my lap, he smiles at me, and I give up on our conversation. Another exchange that ends without any real answers.

I'm used to it by now.

It doesn't stop me, though, from always thinking that somehow, eventually, I'll figure him out. If we keep doing _this_—snatching little moments here and there, time together, alone, away from everything and everyone else. It's almost an obsession, really, because I keep getting older and he keeps beating me and I still don't understand why.

But he's so guarded, even now, after everything, hidden under layers that are as foreign and impermeable as they were when I first met him. And I'm not sure what I'm hoping to learn, after two days in a tiny villa on the French Riviera, that I didn't know last week in Paris.

\-----

It's a short walk down a rocky path to the beach, and Rafa seeks out the sand and the surf as soon as we finish breakfast. He's fearless, swimming far out past the crest of the waves to where the water deepens into smooth, inky blue. From where I'm sitting out on the terrace, watching him, he's just a tiny speck in the ocean. Floating.

I have a book open, but after a while, I find myself focusing less and less on the words in front of me, until finally I'm not even reading anymore. I'm just thinking, mostly—about expectations and pressure and Rafa, and how when (not _if_) I play him again, it will mean everything—losing myself in the shadowy crease down the center of the book, where the pages are stitched tightly together.

The hours and the chapters pass slowly under the sun, and eventually Rafa comes back up the path, flopping down onto the chair next to me, dramatically enough that I pause mid-sentence, glancing up at him.

"It is so nice here," he observes, running fingers through hair thick with salt and sand.

I nod, making a noise in the back of my throat that passes for agreement.

"We could stay, no? More days? I don't have to play Queen's…"

He offers so casually, but it's not that easy.

"I'm meeting Mirka. On Wednesday," I remind him.

"Mm." He stretches out in his chair, arching his back, completely unconcerned. Already moving on.

He never brings up _his_ girlfriend around me. But I can't separate things like he does; I talk about Mirka intentionally, nearly every time we're together, just to see what he'll do. If he cares.

And every time, like now, he just acts completely unaffected.

_It doesn't matter. She's not here. She's not a part of **us**._

I wonder what he tells Xisca to explain what we do. He mentioned once, some months ago when we were holed up in a hotel overlooking Central Park, trapped by the bitterly cold weather and talking to fill the time, that he'd told everyone he was taking a holiday with Carlos. (Which leads me to wonder, sometimes, how closely Rafa guards our secret, and what others he may keep, but I never ask.) That's not an excuse that can work forever, though, and we've seen each other several times since then. I don't know Xisca—I don't know anything about their relationship—but I can't imagine that she wouldn't care.

He closes his eyes, tilting his face into the deepening rays of the sun, and this is the Rafa that I keep in my head. He's sun and summer and sweat and sea, and so completely in his element here that I can't help but stare at him.

I start to let down my defenses, just a little.

Mirka, I think, can sense that something is going on, but I don't think she's worked out yet what it is. Maybe she thinks that these absences are just the latest manifestation of my increasingly pronounced independence, maybe she thinks it's something more, but she rarely forces me to lie to her, and she's always particularly reluctant to question me after a difficult loss.

So it was easy, this time, to get away with Rafa.

His head flops towards me, eyes opening, and I'm embarrassed to be caught looking at him like this. He grins.

"I need to shower," he says, getting up and going inside.

After a few minutes, I shut my book and follow him.

\-----

Sometimes I wish this wasn't so consistently difficult. We never just fall carelessly into each other's arms, like this is natural; instead, it takes a while for the strain to ease, a certain amount of posturing and circling before the tension dissipates enough to get comfortable. Or maybe that's just me—it seems like Rafa is always content to sit back and smile and wait for me to get over myself.

And he knows that I'm there when he comes out of the bathroom, rubbing a towel through his hair, to find me waiting for him in bed. There's the smile, then, and he drops the towel to the floor, loosening the one around his waist and letting it fall, too.

He climbs into bed with me and lays down, pressing his cheek against my bare chest, watching me and waiting with that tiny smile still in place. There's a shocking amount of heat radiating from him after his afternoon in the sun, all the way down to his fingertips where they trail along my belly, burning hot.

I'm hard already, and I grasp his shoulders, pushing him down. And he goes, sliding his way down my body and then tugging off my shorts.

The first touch of his tongue against my cock has me exhaling and curling my fingers in his hair. Rafa isn't the kind of guy who _loves_ giving head; he tolerates it more than anything, it seems like. But what he lacks in enthusiasm he makes up for in raw talent and a keen sensitivity to my needs. He knows what to do, and he does it with precision, quietly—nothing but little wet sounds and carefully measured breaths as he licks and sucks at the head, letting his hand get the rest. I slide my fingers further back until they're brushing the nape of his neck, urging him to take all of it, and he complies, flattening his hand against my stomach and deep-throating me slowly with downcast eyes.

I let my head fall back against the pillow, sighing. It's a pity he isn't more into this; he really does have such a good mouth.

He pauses so that he can shift between my legs, finding a more comfortable position, and then gets back to it, sucking harder, moving faster than before. His hair is cool and damp where it's caught between my fingers and brushing against my thighs, contrasting sharply with the incredible heat of him everywhere else, and I moan, tightening my hold on him. He finally glances up at me then, and his eyes have that look to them, like he thinks he knows everything about me. That he knows that he's breaking me.

And he's so goddamn infuriating, sometimes.

I'm not gentle when I push him off of me, shoving him onto his elbows and knees. And I'm not gentle, a minute later, when I slide into him. It's difficult, because he's tight—_too_ tight. He's not ready, and he's not relaxed at all, which isn't surprising since I didn't really prepare him much—just a couple of slick fingers inside him, briefly, and some lube smeared on the condom. But he doesn't fight; he just grunts and breathes and hides his face.

He never shows me any weakness.

And sometimes, like now, I hate him because of it. I'd give anything to see him crack, to watch that famous composure slip—even for just a second.

My frustration eases once I'm inside him, though, and the rational part of me starts to take over again. I don't feel guilty, necessarily, because I know he'll take it, but it's never really been in my makeup to want to _hurt_ him deliberately. I let up on him a little, slowing down and concentrating on the way I angle into him, and gradually the pinch between his shoulder blades disappears, the anxious, raspy breaths smoothing out and then amplifying again into needy groans.

There's no way to maintain that type of slow, measured rhythm when you're fucking Rafa, though, and within minutes I'm covered in sweat from the frantic pace that I've fallen back into. It's not the way I like to do it, really—I don't like this type of rushed, out of control sex—but he's practically begging for it with his moans and his cries and the persistent way he bends and arches and pushes back against me.

And there's just no way for me to hold back, even though I know that Rafa's not there yet. We've been working up to this for a while—24 hours, yes, but if I'm honest with myself it's been much longer than that—and I can't stretch it out any further.

When I'm done, he looks over his shoulder at me, breathing heavily and wiping the hair away from his face where it's stuck wetly to his cheeks and the corner of his mouth. He's still hard, and he makes a choked, frustrated sound when I pull out, his spine curling with tension. He lets me roll him onto his back, and when I reach for his cock he turns towards me, into the touch, fucking my hand and grabbing at me. I allow myself to be pulled down and tugged closer until we're pressed up against each other, his moans in my ear and his breath on my neck.

He makes a huge mess between both of us when he finally comes.

\-----

Rafa spends the night in the bed with me, which is probably a big improvement over the tile floor. I wake up several times during the night—like you do when you're not used to the person laying next to you—to find my knee gently pressed against the back of his thigh, or his toes grazing my shin. Barely touching.

I'm much more relaxed by morning, though, feeling better for having finally released some of the pent-up tension between us, but Rafa seems restless. I have my laptop out, making my way through the mound of emails in my inbox while Rafa fiddles with the television. Almost all of the channels are in French, naturally, but he doesn't speak the language well enough to understand what's going on. English-speaking CNN is marginally better, and he tries that for a few minutes before impatiently scrolling through again. I can tell he's itching for his Playstation.

He gives up altogether after a while and tugs on running shoes, and I watch out of the corner of my eye as he goes out, into the sun and the heat.

It's very quiet with Rafa gone—just the faint sound of surf filtering in through the open windows and the methodical tapping of my fingers on the keyboard as I work.

There's still coffee in the kitchen from breakfast, and I fix myself a cup before opening an email from Mirka. The first part is businesslike and professional, confirming my flight information for tomorrow. The second is more personal—a short little note, checking to see how I'm doing. I smile at the familiar signature at the end, her name spelled out in blue-green Helvetica, the letters all lowercase.

I send her a quick reply, with a promise to call her tonight.

The last sips of my second cup of coffee have grown cold by the time Rafa comes back, flushed and sweaty. I watch him carefully as he makes his way past me into the kitchen. He's favoring his right foot—just barely, but I know how he moves and I notice the difference.

"Are you alright?" I ask as he grabs a bottle of Evian from the fridge. He unscrews the cap and brings it to his lips, waving me off, like it's nothing, and I watch silently while he downs half of it.

He wipes the back of his hand across his mouth, catching the drops that threaten to drip down his chin, and glances over at me, wrinkling his nose under my scrutiny.

"What?" he asks.

"Nothing," I answer, rubbing at the back of my neck. "You just looked like you were limping when you came in."

A wry little smile flits across his face before he takes another swallow of his water. "You are always so worried all the time, aren't you Roger?" he garbles at me, pointing the bottle in my direction for emphasis. "Sometimes I think you worry too much, about everything, no?"

He's walking down the hallway before I can answer, but I suppose it wasn't really a question anyway.

\-----

I find him later, perched on the edge of the bathtub as he tends to a blister that's opened up on his toe. The reason for all the limping, I assume.

"How bad is it?" I ask, leaning against the doorframe as he glances up at me, hair falling into his eyes.

"Is okay," he says, tucking the loose strands behind his ear. "I probably should not run hard so soon after playing the tournament, but…" He shrugs, smiling sheepishly. "I just need...something."

I watch as he bends his head back down, dripping antiseptic over the area and dabbing away the excess.

"Will it bother you while you're playing?" So much looms in the coming weeks, and it's all I can think about.

Rafa laughs. "No, no." He waves his hand dismissively again. "One day, two…Will be like nothing."

He carefully tapes the blister and then flexes his toes, testing the bandage. Satisfied, he looks up at me again, smiling, and it's so boyish and disarming that I take two steps closer and kiss him without thinking about it.

And then he's all heavy arms looped around my neck and soft lips that part easily to let me get at his tongue.

\-----

There's no rush this time. We spend long minutes getting him ready—my fingers, his fingers, both of us together—slowly working him open until he sighs and trembles and asks me to fuck him. And when he finally slides his knees on either side of my hips and lowers himself onto me, it's easy.

Rafa has no patience for languid, gentle sex—unless he's in charge of it, like now. He gets to arch and preen and dictate everything, and that's what he likes.

And that's what he does, shaking his hair out of his eyes, muscles flexing beneath his skin. Working himself on me slowly, like we have all the time in the world and he wants to go for hours.

It's nice to watch him when he's like this, but I close my eyes, wanting to just feel him for a little while. His fingertips slide up my chest and then curl around my shoulders as he braces himself, shifting around in my lap, sighing and moaning. He's quiet at first, but as the minutes pass he gets louder, the sounds more pronounced. And then, suddenly, he stops altogether.

"Roger," he rasps, and I open my eyes. He looks annoyed, but his expression softens once I focus on him.

"Good?" he asks.

I reach up and brush the backs of my fingers against his cheek, watching as he dips his face into the touch. "Yes."

He smiles, then, and he's beautiful.

I realize, as he starts moving on me again, that that's what Rafa was waiting for. He wants to be admired, appreciated.

Acknowledged.

And there's a little twinge, suddenly, of unwelcome emotion. I immediately try to put it out of my mind, refusing to analyze it, because that's not what this is about. I don't want it to be—I can't _let_ it.

But it's impossible when he's making me feel so incredibly good and he's looking down at me with those eyes and that _smile_…

I slide a hand back between his legs, finding the place where our bodies meet, and the smile twists away as he whines, arching his back.

He topples forwards, burying his fingers in my hair and kissing me. And it's so much easier now, when I don't have to see his face, and I'm lost instead in the combination of softness and pressure that I find in his mouth and the weight of his body laid out on top of mine. I touch him everywhere, long, firm strokes pressing down on his skin until I feel the muscle and bone underneath.

Within moments, though, I'm ready for Rafa to start fucking himself again, because it's too much to be inside him like this, not moving. I kiss him deeply and rub the back of his thighs, trying to encourage him, but he just moans and stays put, teasing me, daring me to give in and give him what he wants.

It feels like he's won when I finally roll him over, frustrated and impatient. His eyes are wild with sex and triumph, hair fanning across the pillow as I push into him, and he grabs at my back, insistent and demanding. He wants it harder, and he likes it _just so_, shifting around and pushing his hips up into mine until it's right.

I'm fascinated by the line of his throat as he tilts his head back, and I follow it with my mouth, feeling the vibration against my lips as he moans. I cup his chin, bringing his face back down so that I can kiss him. I just want him—want his mouth, want all of it, so much—and it doesn't matter that our kisses are rough and uncoordinated, both of us so frenzied and desperate that we can't keep track of what the other is trying to do.

I feel him tightening up, but it still takes me by surprise when he comes, suddenly and wetly, twisting his head to the side as he cries out with a voice raw and breathless from exertion. Fingers slide down to my hips, taking hold, pulling me closer with all the strength contained in his hands, and I kiss his cheek and then his neck, moaning into his skin.

The tension seeps out of him, bit by bit. He's still breathing hard, but his hands are gentle now as they trail along the length of my spine, his body slowly relaxing under me. I pull back to look at his face, smoothing the wet hair away from his forehead as he gazes up at me, biting his lip. He curls his legs around my hips, opening himself up and letting me get deeper. Letting me use him.

"Rafa," I gasp, digging my fingers into his shoulders as I come.

He smiles.

\-----

He lays on me afterwards, face hidden behind the tangled swirl of his hair. He's leaving in an hour, and I feel incredibly subdued, drained by the events of the past two days and the past two weeks. I reach down and work my fingers through his hair, loosening the knots, wondering what he's thinking about. I don't ask.

After a while he stirs, turning his head up and blinking at me, then twisting around even further to look at the clock.

"I should get ready," he mumbles, sliding off the bed.

I watch him silently as he cleans up in the bathroom and tugs on his clothes. He never actually showers, and I turn that thought over in my mind a little as he packs the last of his things and then drags his suitcase out of the room.

He's busy texting on his phone when I join him in the kitchen a few minutes later. He glances at me and then finishes, flipping his phone shut.

I feel like I should say something neutral, meaningless—ask if he's packed all of his stuff, wish him luck at Queen's. Anything. I'm uncomfortable with the silence he brings out in me sometimes.

But nothing comes—except for Rafa, who slides his phone into his pocket and then moves towards me, so close that I can smell myself on him.

The sharpness of his face is magnified when he's this close-up, a collection of mismatched features that don't make sense together until he smiles. His hair is a mess—he should brush it before he leaves, I think absentmindedly—but then he's kissing me, and it doesn't matter anyway.

I probably shouldn't let him do this. It's too indulgent, too intimate, but I don't pull away from him.

He's the only thing I ever do that's blatantly _wrong_. Everything else that people question—parting ways with Tony, my clay court strategy, that Gillette commercial—can be explained away as independence, stubbornness, confidence in my own greatness. But this thing between us? It's indefensible, completely and utterly damning, and it's all become jumbled and disorganized in my head—Rafa, and the sex, and red and green and winning and losing—until I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. Or why.

He nips at my lower lip, taking it between his teeth and tugging, gently. It's a move that women have used on me in the past, and it's no less effective when he does it. For a second I toy with the idea of letting myself get hard again—maybe I could persuade him to suck me off?—but I dismiss the thought. It would take forever, and we don't have time.

A horn sounds outside, emphasizing the point. His taxi.

A bizarre anxiety overtakes me, then, and I push him back, kissing him roughly, and he allows it. Lets me force myself up on him, knee between his thighs and hands on his hips, crushing his spine against the sharp edge of the tile countertop behind him.

After a minute, though, he makes a warning noise in the back of his throat, fingers grasping my hair. But I ignore it, ignore the signals, and it's shocking when I feel his teeth sink into my lip again—not gentle and teasing like before, but sharp and defensive and painful. I jerk back immediately, but his hands in my hair prevent me from going very far. I draw my lower lip into my mouth, a little surprised to discover that I'm not bleeding.

He stares at me with dark eyes, blinking slowly, and I wait, reluctant to move or to say anything, almost afraid of his reaction. Our bodies are still pressed together, though not as aggressively, and finally he cups my face and slowly leans in, carefully licking me right where it stings.

And then he's gone, sliding out of my arms and grabbing his bags. He gives me one last look over his shoulder as he walks out the door.

But no smile.

\-----

Mirka seems surprised when I call and ask her to change my flight reservation, but she doesn't question it. I've decided that I _will_ stay an extra couple of days, but not with Rafa. Just…by myself. It's risky to mess with a proven routine, I know, but I need Halle less than I need time alone to think.

And I have plenty of that now. The house is quiet, but not exactly peaceful; I was always sharply aware of his presence and there's a palpable emptiness now that he's gone.

All I have left are my expectations and my fears, a postponed early-morning flight, and the ache in my lip where he bit me.


End file.
